Had he spoken aloud? He shifted his legs. ‘I was merely reciting a few lines of Shelley.’

She pursed her lips. ‘Shirley?’ A shaft of sunlight pierced the clouds and danced off her rings, ruby and emerald solitaires, big as robin’s eggs. He wondered why she’d been allowed to keep them.

‘I don’t believe we’ve met properly. My name is Vidor Kir—, uh, just Vidor, and you are?’

‘Madame du Chevalier. Enchantée.’ She extended her hand to be kissed. ‘Though that isn’t the name I was born with,’ she said with a sly wink. ‘I acquired it when I went on the stage. But there’s no need for us to be formal. You may call me Hélène.’

The stage? He stifled the urge to laugh.

‘I can see you’re intrigued, so I will tell you. I was a dancer.’ Her flirtatious smile lit up her face. ‘Trained with Balanchine, you know. Though after I tired of the ballet, I did a stint in musical theatre in London’s West End before moving abroad. Though you can’t tell in these trousers,’ she winked again, ‘I have a great set of gams.’

He smiled to be polite, but his puzzlement grew. He’d had the idea she was French, but her accent had a slight English intonation. Or was it American? Is that how she’d acquired it, during her time abroad? Or was this merely a flight of fancy, the product of a diseased brain, where each day she donned a new role. Perhaps, when he saw her again, she would introduce herself as the reincarnated daughter of Isis.

She turned her back to whisper into the bag again. He hoped whatever was in there was not actually alive, or anything that slithered. A shiver coursed through his chest. Ever since finding a poisonous snake curled on his bed as a child, he’d had a morbid fear of them. Let Freud have a field day with the sexual connotations, but snakes were vile and terrifying creatures, that’s all there was to it.

He shifted to the left, preparing to make his exit, when a shadow fell across the lawn. Vidor flinched. He’d thought they were alone, but the Emirati Prince loomed close and slunk past without acknowledgment. As he skirted the bench, he turned his face away from the valley and the mountains beyond. Being from a flat, desert country, navigating such vertiginous heights must be nerve-wracking. Two acrophobics in the Swiss Alps. Who’d have thought they’d have something in common?

As the boy passed behind them, he leaned in close, and Vidor caught a whiff of his aftershave. ‘Salaam alaikum, Saidi.’

Vidor jerked away. ‘What’s that?’

‘You heard me.’ He glanced at Hélène before bending close to Vidor’s ear. ‘Arak lahiqaan.’ A breathy whisper, the flash of white teeth.